“Unless they don’t want to cover their tracks. Unless they want to make an example of someone.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nothing.”
I mentally walk through the Springheel house, from where Marshal Julie was pulling doorman duty to Santa Muerte standing guard over bones and gristle, to the broken magic circle that was really a hexagon drawn to call dark forces. One dark force. The eater. Did Cabal and Cosima know that Enoch Springheel was a Bone Daddy and sent him something special delivery? But why bother? From what everyone is saying, the Springheels were about as low as you could get and still have indoor plumbing. If you wanted to off somebody to make a point, why not go for the Geistwalds? But the Ashes are too smart for that. And if they just wanted to have fun, they’d go for civilian rubes, not another Sub Rosa. Still, there is a dead guy and the demon that ate him.
I don’t even know why I care. I didn’t know the guy. I don’t know any of these people. But I don’t like being lied to, especially if being lied to gets me shot. Springheel gets eaten. Lucifer gets bushwhacked. Another Sub Rosa named Spencer Church is missing. Carlos lost his pal, Toadvine, and that woman at Bamboo House is missing a kid. Probably none of this has anything to do with me, but as long as Lucifer means to drag me along into the Sub Rosa’s billion-dollar outhouse, I know there’s a gun pointed at the back of my head.
“Give me the Walter Cronkite on Hell. What’s the weather like down there?”
Kasabian turns from the movie and looks at me. He sighs.
“There’s nothing to tell. It’s the usual mess. Guys stabbing guys. Women stabbing guys who just stabbed guys. It’s rerun season down there. Nothing new.”
“The other night I was walking around East L.A. and for a second I thought I saw Mason.”
“You didn’t. That’s impossible.”
“Then he’s down there. You’ve seen it.”
“I don’t have to see it. I know.”
“From Lucifer?”
“I just know.”
“That’s not good enough. I need to know what’s happening. Lucifer is here for a reason and it’s not to make a damned movie.”
“Can’t help you. Speaking of movies, shut up. The two traveling doctors are about to open Barbara Steele’s coffin and bring her back to life.”
When you make a threat, make it big. When you make it big, make sure you’re prepared to go all in if someone calls you on it.
I go to the table and hit the power switch on Kasabian’s monitor.
“Hey, I’m watching that.”
I grab Kasabian and his deck under one arm, pull open the door, and carry him downstairs.
He stage-whispers, “Put me down! Take me back!”
I carry Kasabian straight out the back door to the alley. If any customers caught a glimpse of a head on a deck, they would just think I was throwing away a mannequin or an old movie promotion.
Kasabian is pretty discreet considering his situation. He doesn’t start screaming until I close the back door.
“What the fuck are you doing, man? Take me back inside.”
“It’s time for you to leave the nest, Tweety Bird. The world is your oyster. I saw a ‘Help Wanted’ sign at Donut Universe. With your managerial skills, you’ll be running the place by the end of the week. Vaya con Dios, Alfredo Garcia.”>Time for a drink. Something to loosen up and let little Stark out of the basement, where he’s been locked up playing five-card stud with Norman Bates’s mom. She cheats, of course. The dead think they can get away with anything because you’ll feel sorry for them. If you play cards with the dead, make sure you deal and don’t let them buy you drinks. They’ll slip you a formaldehyde roofie and pry the gold fillings out of your teeth.
I pour a tumbler of JD and take a long sip. Whiskey doesn’t mix well with toothpaste, but I already filled the glass, and once whiskey’s been let loose you have to deal with it, like love or a rabid dog.
There’s a crumpled bag from Donut Universe on the floor. I drink and Kasabian likes glazed chocolate with sprinkles. We’re the trailer trash that Dorothy never met in Oz.
I tear a square from the bag and fold it over and over again, trying to remember the pattern. When I’m done, I have a lopsided origami crane. I put it on the bedside table, tear another square, and start folding. It takes a couple tries, but I end up with a kind of thalidomide bunny. Now I’m on a roll and make a fish, a dog, and an elephant whose legs are too long. Like he escaped from a Dalí painting.
I set up my inbred critters around the whiskey tumbler like carousel animals and whisper a few words to them, not in Hellion, but in quiet English, like I’m trying to coax a cat out from under the bed.
My mother once told me a story she said got left out of the Bible. It’s when Jesus was a young boy. He snuck off from the fields where His family was working and Mary finds Him on a riverbank making birds out of mud. The little sculptures are lined up next to Him, drying in the sun. Mary yells at Him and tells Him to come back to work. Jesus gets up but before He goes He waves His hands over the mud birds and they come to life and fly away. A great way to let your folks know you’re not going into the family business.